Acquittal ‘as close as you can get . . . to a finding of innocence,’ says lawyer

Two Ontario Liberals were acquitted of Election Act bribery charges Tuesday in a case the party and one of the defendants suggested was only brought to trial because of political motivations.

The judge hearing the case granted a directed verdict application from the defence that called for the charges to be tossed before any defence witnesses were called. Based on the Crown’s evidence alone, no reasonable jury could convict the pair on trial, the judge concluded.

The ruling means the case has been dismissed against Pat Sorbara, who was Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s deputy chief of staff and Liberal campaign director, and local Liberal fundraiser Gerry Lougheed.

The pair were accused of offering would-be candidate Andrew Olivier a job or appointment to step aside for Wynne’s preferred candidate in a 2015 byelection in Sudbury.

The judge found Olivier never could have been the candidate because Wynne already had decided to appoint Glenn Thibeault — then the NDP MP and now the energy minister.

“The applicants could not induce someone to refrain from becoming something he could never become,” said the judge.

The case was a politically charged one from the start.

After the controversy first arose a couple of months before the Sudbury byelection, both opposition parties called on the provincial police and Elections Ontario to investigate. Since then the case has spawned endless attacks against the Liberals.

It even led the premier to move to sue Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown for defamation for saying she was personally on trial.

Acquittals will not end those attacks, the opposition parties signalled in statements moments after the court ruling.

“This whole episode is but one part of a consistent pattern of political corruption,” Brown wrote. “We’re worried about what they’ve been able to keep hidden and are fearful of what scandal will come next.”

A statement from the Ontario Liberals said Sorbara is being welcomed back to the election campaign team as the province heads to the polls next summer. She remains on a leave of absence from her deputy chief of staff position in the premier’s office.

Acquittals on a directed verdict are very rare, Sorbara’s lawyer Brian Greenspan said.

“It’s as close as you can get, factually, to a finding of innocence,” he said.